Silvia Della Manna is a PhD student in Historical Studies at the University of Milan, with a research project entitled Bologna 1350-1360: lordship authority and city society in the Visconti decade. The research aims to investigate the ways in which the Visconti’s family attempted to govern a city distant from the Lombard context not only geographically, but also in terms of social composition and political tradition. This distance is reflected significantly in terms of figurative politics, as the settlement of Archbishop Giovanni at the head of the Bolognese Commune influenced the city’s decorative apparatus and the use of heraldry.
